Tuesday, December 4, 2012

Introduction To Poetry Analysis

In
“Introduction to Poetry” by Billy Collins, Collins tries to explain that poetry
is something more than words on paper and that really it is a great experience.
Often readers will read the poem and assume they understand the meaning of that
poem after one trial. In Collin’s viewpoint this is false. In the first line
where “I” is referring to Billy Collins and “them” is referring to his readers.

Throughout the poem Collins uses a
series of metaphors to help the reader better understand how most readers treat
a poem. In the first couple of lines he asks “them” to “take a poem and hold it
up to the light like a color slide or press an ear against its hive.” What
Collins is trying to say is no one will truly know the meaning of a poem until
it is carefully read and reviewed over many times. He uses a colored slide as
an example. You cannot completely see everything on a colored slide until it is
held up against the light, just as you cannot understand the true meaning of a
poem until you carefully review it. He goes on to say, “I say drop a mouse into
a poem and watch him probe his way out, or walk inside the poem’s room and feel
the walls for a light switch.” Collins
successfully compares a “poem” to a maze and a dark room in a house. He reveals
the feeling of being lost or frustrated through the thoughts of
misunderstandings when reading a poem. In my opinion Collins does drive me to a
conclusion that poems are hard to interpret until several frustrating attempts
to understand it. In the third or fourth stanza Collins then explains that
poems can also be exciting. He compares a poem as the enjoyment of waterskiing.
Yet, in the last few lines Collins provides a sharp contrast, in terms of the
amount of tone and imagery. He compares the poem to a person being tortured and
being forced to confess. He believes that readers try to take their opinion of
the poem and disregard the true meaning of it. What Collins is trying to do is
remind and teach the readers to always be patient and open minded when reading
a poem.

In my conclusion Collins morale of
the story is very significant. Rather than skimming through a poem with little
understand of what it means all readers must get “inside” the poem to better
understand it and then enjoy the rewards that come with the meaning. This idea
is not applied to how most readers read today but I hope to see examples of
them later in life. Foremost, it helps readers develop a more enhanced way to
learn through memorization. Which can then be applied to other situations such
as studying for a test. In the end we can better interpret how things work and
then grow upon that, introducing more and better goals through vast learning
experiences. Here is another critical essay of the work.